Runaway
by illuminata79
Summary: This is the sequel of "Rage and Reputation". Mick is on his way to Maine - or is he? - and Alice is, of course, desperate to find her son.
1. A Long Wait

Dr. Daniel Cleaver was washing his hands at the sink in the corner of his office for the last time on what had been a very long and strenuous working day. Mrs. Hodgson had come rushing in after hours because her daughter's nose was bleeding again. Luckily he had succeeded in stopping the nosebleed quickly and had just seen off mother and daughter, hoping that no other emergency would arise and he could go home now. He was looking forward to a quiet dinner with his wife and Mick, and maybe he would make it home in time to give Jess and Janie their goodnight kisses and read them a bedtime story.

He dried his hands, pushed his glasses onto his forehead and rubbed his tired eyes for a moment before he cast one final glance around the room. He groaned when he heard a low but steady banging on the front door. Another patient. Just what he needed now. This had better be urgent, or the ever-friendly Dr. Cleaver would show his irritable side for once.

He unlocked the door and opened it, wondering for a moment if he had been mistaken when he saw no one. Then he dropped his gaze to find a very upset five-year-old on the doorstep, cheeks streaked with tears, hazel braids half dissolved, panting heavily.

"Jessica!" he exclaimed, squatting down to face her. "What are you doing here? Have you come here all on your own?"

"Daddy, come quick! Mommy won't stop crying, she's just sitting there and makes strange noises, and Janie is crying, too, and Mick … Mick …" She couldn't go on. Big tears were streaming over her round pink cheeks again, and she sobbed heartbreakingly.

"What is it with Mick, love? Where is he? What has happened? Is he hurt?"

"He's gone, Daddy! He's gone away and he won't come back!"

Dan shook his head and said reassuringly, "He will come back, I'm sure. Now let's go home and find out what really happened." He picked Jess up and walked the short way to the house as fast as he could without running. He wasn't an athletic man and wouldn't have lasted a minute if he had started running with the child in his arms.

When he pushed open the front door, he found Alice still sitting on the stairs, gasping for air between fits of racking sobs. She hardly seemed to notice his arrival. He sat next to her, touched her shoulder gingerly and asked, "Hush, Alice, calm down. Tell me what happened."

She held a crumpled paper out to him without a word, staring at him with puffy eyes so red that their original colour was barely distinguishable. He scanned the scribbled message and said slowly, "We will find him, Alice. He'll come back."

"Dan", she whispered in a choked voice, "I struck him. He'll never forgive me. I'll never forgive myself."

"Don't say that, Alice. Every kid gets slapped once in a while. Most of them actually deserve it, and they get over it eventually."

"It wasn't just a slap, Dan. He was bleeding. I must have caught his lip with my ring." This set off another round of wild sobs.

Dan patted her back helplessly and said, "That's bad, and I can imagine you feel awful about it, but I'm sure you didn't do it on purpose. Please try to calm yourself. Let's be practical now. He says he's going to Maine. I'm sure that means he'll be on his way to his grandparents. Let's phone them and tell them to let us know when he arrives. I'll go there and get him. My father can cover for me in the practice while I'm away."

Alice took a deep, ragged breath. She wasn't sure if she admired him for staying so cool in this situation or if she hated him for showing so little empathy for her agony over what she had done to her son and her fear that she might have driven him away for good.

"My parents haven't got a telephone", she sighed. "You know what my father is like. He doesn't think much of what he calls 'newfangled nonsense'. I've always said they should get a phone, but …"

"Well then, do you have a number for any of their neighbours or anyone else in the village?"

"I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I don't know … there might be … but I don't think … perhaps in my …" Alice realized that she was babbling like an idiot and pulled herself together. "I think I might have the number of the Phillipses somewhere." With knees that felt like jelly, she rose from the stairs and went over to her desk in the corner of the living-room.

It seemed ages that she had been sitting there, writing the to-do list that had been the most important thing on her mind just a few hours ago.

She avoided looking at the sofa with the squished cushions or at the armchair where she had left her twisted, tear-drenched lace handkerchief. Her heart was heavy enough without those reminders of what she had done.


	2. A Long Walk

I had been travelling for more than thirty-six hours when I stumbled off the train in Portland in the pouring rain. I'd spent part of the first night huddled into the corner of a deserted waiting hall somewhere in Kentucky until the first train east left in the early morning. I had lost count of how often I had changed trains and how much time I had wasted sitting around on draughty platforms in places I'd forgotten the minute I left, waiting for my next connection. The long journey had become an indistinct blur of landscapes whizzing past the windows of the train.

I had hardly eaten since lunch on the day I left, only the sandwich that nice elderly lady on the train to St. Louis had pulled from her basket when my stomach had rumbled audibly and some battered peaches I'd had in my bag, and was long past feeling hungry. Exhausted, I had slept through most of today, waking up when the train shuddered to a halt in Portland station late on a gloomy grey afternoon.

It was pouring. People hastily fumbled for their umbrellas or pulled their hats down low on their brow. I had neither an umbrella nor a hat. I didn't have anything useful with me except for the penknife in my pocket. All I had hastily stuffed into my emptied schoolbag prior to my haphazard departure through Mom's bedroom window and down over the roof of the back porch was my copy of "Treasure Island" with my father's photo inside, my savings – of which now remained a measly little heap of small change – and the grey cotton sweater I had put on over my shirt at some point in a futile attempt at keeping warm.

The money I had left wasn't even enough to buy a ticket for the slow train to the village, so I would have to walk. It was just six or seven miles, basically no big deal for someone as well trained in swimming and running and walking longer distances as I was, but I was already shivering in my thin clothes with cold and exhaustion the very moment I got off the train and half-starved on top of everything else.

The road dragged on and on. Water dripped from my hair, running into my collar, trickling down my back in freezing little rivulets. My trousers were soaked to the knees, and as I had simply given up trying to avoid the endless succession of puddles on my way, my shoes were soon drenched with filthy slop.

I plodded on and on stubbornly, the alluring vision of Grandma's warm and cosy kitchen and of a sofa to sleep on the only thing that kept me going. All other thoughts were stowed away somewhere in the back of my mind, except, strangely, for some snippets of children's songs and nursery rhymes circling through my tired brain with unnerving obstinacy. I had a headache that grew worse steadily, and my neck and shoulders felt stiff and tense. A blister began to form on my right heel, the hard leather of my shoe chafing against the sore spot painfully with every step.

Once, I stopped under a large tree for a moment, leaning against its rough bark, glad to be sheltered from the rain that was still beating down relentlessly. I yearned to sit or better lie down for a while, but the sensible part of me was still alert enough to realize that would be the worst I could possibly do, so I trudged on, mechanically putting one foot in front of the other.

When I took the turnoff towards the coastal path, I had no eyes for the sight I normally loved more than almost anything else and couldn't get enough of. For the first time in my life, I hardly deigned to look out over the sea. I knew without looking that it would be choppy and grey and forbidding and just shuffled on.

Finally, the lights of the village appeared dimly in the distance. I sped up a little, although every muscle in my body ached. Promptly, I tripped on a large tree root that jutted into the narrow pathway and found myself sprawled in the mud. I picked myself and my soiled bag up, tried in vain to wipe my dirty hands clean on my damp trousers and didn't have the strength to resist the desire to shed childish tears at the humiliation of being covered in soggy sludge from head to toe.

By the time I arrived at my grandparents' little house, I couldn't have said for certain if it was tears or rain that clouded my vision. My head was swimming, a steady pain hammered in my temples. I was cold and hot at the same time, my clothes drenched with rain and sweat.

I longed to stretch myself out on the worn old sofa in the warm, familiar kitchen, to have some hot tea or soup and to be fussed about a bit by Grandma. This was just a knock on the door away, but I hesitated, leaning against the wall lest my wobbly knees gave way, suddenly afraid that coming here had been a terrible mistake.

While Grandpa had always defended my right to choose my own way through life, he had also made me promise I would at least finish school before deciding on my future.

I had tried very hard to keep my promise, but I just couldn't stand life at "home" any more. The row with Mom had just been the tip of the iceberg, the straw that broke the camel's back.

Mom had never given up on her high-flying plans for me. She wanted me to continue my education in college, preferably to become a doctor like Dan and come back to succeed him in his practice one day, like he had succeeded his father. Keep the family business running. I knew her intentions were good, but the life she was imagining for me within the limits of the town, the sea hundreds of miles away, seemed unbearably predictable and dull.

She had dismissed my dreams of travelling the seas as childish fantasies that I'd outgrow one day. Most of my classmates had shared my ambition of setting out to see the great big world out there when we had been nine or ten or dreamed of other exciting careers, military generals and police chiefs, firemen and ocean liner captains, but by now they had downsized their dreams as society demanded and aspired to be farmers and tailors and mechanics like their fathers, to take over their farms and shops, to get married and stay in this place forever, whereas I seriously kept holding on to my vision.

I wanted to get out, get away from all the well-meant exhortations to be good and work hard and pray and fit in.

I didn't want to fit into that place. Mom might be happy in her role as the doctor's wife and as one of those pillars of the parish – she wasn't overly religious but had formed close ties with many ladies from the local congregation and their families – and had seemed to feel at home in no time.

I still hated just about everything there. I despised the gossip, the watchful eyes of Mom's friends, the narrow-mindedness, the charity bazaars and church outings and garden parties where you met the same people over and over and over again. Everybody knew everything about everybody else, and nobody ever seemed to do anything on their own.

All that gregarious activity felt oppressive and stifling to me. I wanted to be left alone with all that. I didn't mind being different, but I was disappointed that Mom didn't understand when I begged them to let me stay at home instead of being presented as the doctor's stepson at the umpteenth church picnic. But God forbid that someone should suspect the doctor's family was less than perfect. In towns like these, it was all about appearances and reputation and doing what society dictated. My aversion to all that grew more and more the older I got.

I loved my willow by the river and my books and music all right, but the only people I loved unconditionally in this place were my sisters. I would miss Jess and Janie badly, and I hoped Mom wouldn't succeed in turning them into well-behaved, neatly dressed, totally brainless miniature ladies like the daughters of some of her friends, but that was not enough to make me stay.

I squared my shoulders, shaking the rain out of my hair and wiping down my face with the white handkerchief the old lady on the train had given me. I hadn't travelled for two full days and nights to hover timidly outside my grandparents' house. I turned towards the door and knocked twice.

Nothing stirred. With a sinking feeling, I wondered if they had gone out.

I knocked again, louder.

Waited, heart pounding, almost ready to concede defeat.

Then, finally, energetic steps behind the door, and I could hear my grandmother's voice, so strong and loud for such a dainty woman, calling out to Grandpa, "John, keep an eye on the soup while I answer the door. It's probably Ted, he promised to bring –"

She stopped abruptly as the door swung open and she saw me, eyes wide in surprise. One hand flew up to touch her hair in a gesture of sheer bewilderment.

"Mick! My God, boy, what are _you _doing here? How did you get here? Just look at you! Soaking wet and dirty from head to toe, and where's that blood coming from?" She brought out a hankie and dabbed at my face.

Trying to clean my face was so typical of her that I managed a little smile. A sharp sting of pain shot through my head, and I winced and closed my eyes for a moment.

"Mick! What's wrong? Are you ill?" Grandma cried.

I swayed, suddenly dizzy, staggering against the doorframe with my eyes still shut.

"John! Come quick!" Grandma shouted. I felt her arm around my middle in an attempt to steady me, but she was too tiny to support my full weight.

"Jesus, Mick! What the heck …" My grandfather's rumbling baritone, his characteristic heavy footsteps hurrying over, his hand on my shoulder. "Sit down on the stairs for a minute before you break down on the spot", he said gruffly.

I turned my head sideways to look at him, but the movement made me dizzy again. My stomach lurched, and I groaned. "I'm so dizzy", I whispered. "I'm feeling so sick."

Grandpa helped me sit down on the stairs and sat beside me, lightly patting me on the back. "Breathe deeply now, my lad. Keep calm. It'll pass."

Grandma went to fetch a towel and gently dried my face and hair, careful not to jog my head too much.

I took a few deep breaths, inhaling and exhaling slowly. I felt so relieved that they hadn't given me hell for running away from Missouri (at least not immediately), so glad to be out of the rain and cold and off my feet, that tears began to flow again. I just couldn't help it. I sniffled helplessly.

Grandpa went on in a somewhat more severe tone, "And although I'm dying to hear why you're showing up here without a warning, all soaked through and filthy, and I'll be damned if your mom knows where you are, I won't ask you any questions now. We will have a serious talk about that later. Do you think you can get up?"

"M-hm", I murmured but didn't move.

"Let me take those dirty shoes off you before you spoil the carpet", Grandma interjected, kneeling down to untie my laces, prise the sodden shoes and socks from my cold feet and rub them dry. "Goodness, Mick, your feet are icy! And they have grown so large that I haven't got any socks for you to wear … dear me, your heel is bleeding, too! I'll take care of that in a moment. Now go and take off those wet clothes. We've got a nice fire going in the kitchen, that'll get you warmed up in no time. I'll see if I can find something for you to wear. John, you get him another towel and a blanket."

I shuffled into the kitchen, feeling shakier by the minute, and dropped down on the sofa in the corner, dirty clothes and all. Grandpa helped me peel off my soaked sweater, shirt and trousers and towelled me off so roughly and thoroughly as if trying to strip off my skin. I didn't complain, though. I was far too busted.

Grandma came back with a bundle of clothes – flannel plaid pajamas and Grandpa's quilted dressing gown. I struggled into them as best I could without getting up. I was sure my legs wouldn't carry me if I tried to stand.

I was taller than Grandpa now, so the sleeves were much too short and my legs stuck out ridiculously, too, but I didn't care. Wrapping Grandma's old grey blanket around me, I leaned back into the familiar worn brown cushions. My head seemed ready to explode at any moment, my cheeks were burning, while my hands and feet were clammy and cold as ice and shivers kept running down my back. My limbs ached, my throat felt sore, and there was a dull pain in my chest.

After Grandma had cleansed and bandaged my heel, she tried to feed me a bit of soup, which I found embarrassing. She handed me the spoon when I protested, but I barely ate a few spoonfuls before exhaustion finally took its toll on me and I fell asleep, spoon still in hand.

I don't remember much of the following days that passed in a feverish haze. Grandma had brought some pillows and a quilt to turn the kitchen sofa into a comfortable bed for me. I slept most of the time, a fitful sleep often disrupted by breathing difficulties caused by my blocked nose or coughing fits that gave me a piercing, stabbing pain in my lungs. Sometimes I managed to sit up long enough to eat a bit, and once Dr. Logan came to examine me, prescribed some medicine and bed rest and talked to my grandparents in a serious tone at the far end of the room while I was drifting back off into sleep.

One thing I recall very clearly is the dream. For the first time in years, I dreamed of my father. He was rowing a small boat away from a sandy cove on the rocky coast near Grandpa's house while I tried to run along the beach, desperate to catch up with him. My feet, however, kept sinking into the fine sand, deeper and deeper until I was hardly able to move. I wanted to call out for him, but no sound came from my mouth, no matter how hard I tried.

I woke up to find Grandma's warm dry hand on my cheek, wiping away my tears. She gave me a moist-eyed smile and said, "You've been having some bad dreams, it seems. You were crying out for your daddy all the time and struggling against the covers and I couldn't wake you."

With my mind still ensnared in the realm of the dream and numbed by the ongoing fever, completely disoriented in space and time, I absently asked, "Where's Dad?"

"Mick? Are you raving?" Grandma gasped in horrified puzzlement, gripping my face with both hands to stare into my bewildered eyes.

I blinked at her confusedly.

"You know where your daddy is, don't you?"

The fearfully pleading tone of her unusually small voice shocked me into realizing what I had said. Mortified, I looked away. "Of course I know. It was just the dream", I croaked in a thick voice. "I felt so alone. I miss him still."

"I know, dear. I wish I could bring him back. You'd need your father around." She sighed. "But you're not alone as long as we are there. And your mom, of course."

I didn't want to think of my mother. I didn't want to think of the state of frenzy she'd have worked herself and everyone else into by now. I couldn't imagine ever facing her again, her reproachful voice, her look of disappointment. I was a failure in her eyes, that much was certain. Maybe she wasn't quite wrong about that, considering my screwed-up attempt at running away.

"Speaking of your mother, I'm going to go over to the Mulligans' to use that telephone thingy. Your mom needs to know where you are." She pushed aside some stray curls that had fallen over my eyes.

I wanted to object fiercely, feeling betrayed, but I didn't have the strength for loud protest or a lengthy argument.

Turning over on my side, away from Grandma's touch, I buried my head in the pillows and pretended to doze off again.


	3. Back to Maine

Three days into Mick's disappearance, Alice was teetering on the brink of a nervous breakdown. They hadn't had any word from or about the boy. Alice had been sure that she would find him with her parents – where else in Maine should he have gone? – but now she began to doubt her theory. Surely her parents would have tried to let her know that Mick was safe with them if he was there. Shouldn't he have arrived there by now if that was where he had been going? What if the mention of Maine was a red herring? He had been very upset and badly hurt in his pride, and he was a clever lad. She wouldn't put such a cunning move past him.

She had tried to phone the Phillipses several times in the past two days, but they seemed to be out of town. She dialled the number once more, again to no avail. She wanted to smash the useless phone against the wall in frustration. Instead, she gripped the fabric of her skirt tightly with both hands, letting out a deep sigh.

She walked over to her desk to pick up the framed photograph that had been taken in the garden just a few weeks ago. It showed her three children in their Sunday best. Mick was kneeling in the grass in a white shirt, dark trousers and matching waistcoat, one arm holding a laughing Janie against his chest, the other wrapped around the waist of Jess who was leaning on his shoulder, beaming at her brother. The girls wore matching white lacy dresses and shining shoes, and even Mick flashed one of his rare dazzling smiles at the photographer.

"Oh, Mick", she whispered. "Where are you, love?" Her eyes filled with tears yet again. "Where the hell are you?"

Alice never swore under normal circumstances, but the uncertainty was killing her. Dan had forbidden her to imagine all kinds of horrible things that might have happened to the boy, but they kept popping into her head anyway.

If something bad occurred to him, wherever he was, it would be her fault. She had driven him away. She had hurt him. Not just literally, although she was still feeling dreadful for slapping him, drawing blood. What she had seen in his eyes the moment before he ran from the room had been much more than physical pain.

She bit her lip so hard that she expected to taste the metallic tang of blood any second.

At the same moment, the telephone jangled. She flinched as the harsh noise jarred her frayed nerves, hurrying into the hall with her heart hammering wildly, snatching the receiver from its cradle.

"Hello?"

"Alice? Is that you?"

The voice was unmistakable even through the crackle of static on the bad line. "Mother?" Alice's voice sounded unpleasantly shrill to her own ears.

"Alice? Can you hear me? I hope this telephone thing works! I'm at Mrs. Mulligan's, you know."

"Yes, I can hear you very well!" Alice yelled impatiently. "What is it? Is Mick –"

"I didn't want to keep you waiting for a letter to arrive, that's why I asked Mrs. Mulligan if I could use her telephone. Perhaps you will want to come. Mick is here. He arrived at our doorstep last night, soaking wet, with nothing on him except his schoolbag and the clothes on his back. What on earth happened? Did he run away?"

"Thank God", Alice whispered instead of an answer, feeling faint with relief, missing part of her mother's next sentence.

"…says it will take at least a week until he's able to travel."

"Sorry, but what did you just say?"

"I said Mick won't be able to travel for a while, Alice. He's quite ill."

Alice's cold fingers were clenched almost painfully around the receiver. "But he was …", she began stupidly and broke off. "What is it?" she asked instead.

"He arrived here, looking like a ghost and burning with fever. He's got a very bad cold, sore throat and runny nose and all, and the fever's still up, so the doctor isn't sure if he's developing something worse than a cold. He's going to check on him again tomorrow, so we'll know more by then." Her mother's voice was very calm and matter-of-factly, but Alice sensed the urgency behind her words. A stone-cold fear gripped her heart.

With white bloodless lips, she said, "I'm on my way."

* * *

><p>Alice arrived at the little village station the next evening. The night on the sleeping train had not been very restful. She had tossed and turned in her uncomfortable berth in anguish, and when she did fall asleep for a while, nightmares had plagued her, nightmares so gruesome that she was unable to recall them without her pulse quickening and her stomach rising. The rest of the journey had been spent deeply lost in a paralysing mixture of guilt and fear and self-reproach. The slow, unfazed chugging of the train unnerved her. Sitting there with nothing to do but think was pure torture.<p>

What if her mother had not told her everything on the telephone? What if the turn for the worse was not just a suspected possibility but bitter truth? Mick had always enjoyed a very robust health, but this was no guarantee. She had seen more than one promising young life obliterated by sudden illness. Just a few months ago, a friend had lost her fourteen-year-old daughter to pneumonia.

Alice couldn't stop brooding. At some point she swore never to berate any of her children again for small offenses if only Mick survived this.

However, when she emerged from the train on the first sunny day in a week to meet her grim-looking father, she was every inch the lady she had trained herself to be, wearing in a practical but elegantly cut navy dress with pale grey trim and matching little hat. They greeted each other somewhat stiffly. Her father took the little suitcase off her with grumbling chivalry to carry it during the short walk home. They didn't speak.

Alice's apprehension grew with every step. She was eager to arrive but afraid of what she might find there.

Her mother welcomed her much warmer than her father had, with a hug and a smile that soothed Alice's fears a little. She wouldn't have smiled so genuinely if Mick was in grave danger.

"How is he doing?" she asked with an anxious quiver in her voice.

"A bit better, all in all. The fever's down a little, and he's breathing easier now that the worst of the sniffles is over, but he's still got a sore throat and that pain in his chest. The doctor thinks it's a mild case of pleurisy after all. It'll take some time and it seems to be rather painful, but it's nothing really serious. He'll be right as rain in a few weeks' time. Now let's look in on him."

Alice breathed a sigh of relief and followed her mother through the little hallway into the large kitchen. This had always been the heart of the house and still was. She remembered how Mick had loved sleeping there as a child, during the hard years after Henry's death. He had never minded the adults lingering in the kitchen past his bedtime. She had always had the impression that their presence, their low-voiced talk and quiet activity – sewing, knitting, repairing fishing nets – had helped him sleep.

Little had changed since she had lived here. The large old table, the simple wooden chairs, the big iron stove were all the same, and so was the brown sofa by the window.

Its occupant was sound asleep, lying on his side with his back turned on the world, one arm wrapped firmly around a corner of the quilt. Her mouth curved into a small wistful smile. He had slept like this ever since he had been very young. In fact, he looked just like the little boy he'd used to be with his flushed cheeks and his tousled hair.

"I'm going to leave the two of you alone for a while", her mother said and went out through the back door.

Alice pulled up a chair and sat down by the sofa. Gingerly, she extended her arm and hesitated for a moment before lightly brushing the tangled curls back from his face. Her stomach lurched unpleasantly when her eyes fell on the blood-encrusted spot above his upper lip. She hoped that it would heal without a trace. Seeing the imprint of her lapse of temper permanently carved into his unblemished face would be unbearable.

Involuntarily, she glanced down at her fingers. She had taken off the sapphire ring on that bad day and wouldn't wear it again soon, but she half expected to find specks of blood remaining on her hands.

Motionless, she sat there for a while, just watching her son sleep. Listening to his quick and shallow breathing, seeing his long jet-black lashes flutter occasionally, suppressing the urge to touch him, to hold him the way she had done when he'd been little. Or the way Henry had. Given the choice, Mick had always preferred to be carried around and cuddled by his dad, even as a baby.

She felt a sting of regret at the thought, both for the loss of Henry and for her relationship with Mick that had started to veer off track early on and had suffered irreparable damage when she forgot herself so badly.

Mick stirred and began to cough. When the attack subsided, she laid a tentative hand on his shoulder. He shifted on his pillow without opening his eyes, his mouth twitching a little as if he wanted to speak.

"Mick … are you awake? It's me", she said softly.

He rolled over on his back and squinted at her, frowning. "Mom." His voice was still throaty and rough. He ran the tip of his tongue over his chapped lips and whispered under his breath, "Are you still mad at me?"

Alice shook her head. "No, I'm not. You gave us quite a fright, disappearing like that! I should be angry at you for causing us so much worry, but at the moment I'm simply glad that I have you back and that you're going to be fine again soon. When Grandma rang and told me you were so ill, I was so afraid you'd ... you might …" She paused, unable to say the unthinkable. A small sob escaped her. "… I might never see you again", she finished, clutching his hand.

Mick said nothing, just looked at her, inscrutable.

"I'm not sure if you can forgive me for what I … for what happened before you ran away, but I want you to know that I'm deeply sorry. I should never have lost my temper like that", she went on, squeezing his hand even harder, hoping to see some kind of reaction.

Without much emotion, he replied in a matter-of-fact tone, "It's alright, Mom. These things happen. I'm sure you didn't mean to hit me so hard." It sounded like he was talking about someone else. He appeared entirely uninvolved, but she noticed how he pushed his jaw forward ever so slightly and averted his eyes from her face, extracting his hand from hers, gently but deliberately. Had his fingers lingered on hers for the fraction of a second or was that wishful thinking?

Her heart remained heavy. She sensed that Mick would not be able to forgive or forget the incident easily, even if he had dismissed it with such ostensible generosity. Helplessly, she tugged the hem of her skirt over her knees and brushed some imaginary fluff from her lap, keeping her hands busy, the hands that longed to caress her son but didn't dare to.

She got up to pour herself a glass of water at the sink and sipped it slowly, looking out of the window into the garden where her mother was tending her vegetable plants.

"Mom?"

She whirled round, ready to answer any question, to make any concession. "Yes?"

"Can I have a glass of water, too?"

"Oh … of course." Disappointed, she filled another glass and returned to her chair.

Mick drank thirstily and promptly started coughing again. He sat up straight, then bent over, wincing and clutching at his chest, obviously in pain.

Alice took the glass off him, set it down on the floor and stroked his back, murmuring soothing nonsense until the coughing fit was over. This time he didn't fight against her touch, even allowing her to hold him close for a minute before slumping back into his pillow.

There were so many questions she had for him, but she refrained from asking them now, fearing she would spoil the precious moment. There would be plenty of time for questions later on. She hoped there would be some answers, too.


	4. Back to Work

Grandpa and I were walking into the village under a splendid azure summer sky, dotted with a few fat white clouds. We had been out fishing all day long, working hand in hand, mostly in harmonious silence. I had gone out on his boat with Grandpa for years and knew almost anything he could teach me about herring and sardine fishing or about navigating and maintaining a boat.

After unloading the day's considerable haul at the fish market, we took a detour via Jeremiah Smith's grocery store. Jem was an old friend of Grandpa's. Today he had received a delivery of fine potatoes from Aroostook County, and we were supposed to pick up a nice big sack for Grandma.

I got along well with Jem. Like Grandpa, he had always treated me like a proper person, not like a child who was ordered to listen and obey and had no right to be heard.

"How's things, young man?" he asked me. "I hear you've been through a bad bout of the flu. And at that time of year, too."

"I really had it bad, but I'm quite fine again. Thanks for asking, though. How's your knee?"

"Gives me aches and pains whenever the weather changes, as it always does. Nothing new there. But John, I heard you had a rare visitor recently? Fair Alice paid a call to her old home? Martha saw her on her way to the station when she was in town."

Grandpa pushed back his cap, scratching his head, and pulled it back in place with a grimace. "She's turned into a lady, Alice has. She's no fisherman's girl any more. Doesn't belong here. Couldn't get back to her doctor fast enough as soon as Mick was doing better."

Jem nodded gravely. "Well, John, ain't much you can do about it, huh?"

"Nothing at all. I don't begrudge her that good life she leads, but I wish she'd not gone so far away from home. And from her roots."

"But the young one, he's a chip off the old block, isn't he? He's a Mainer born and bred, even if he's not living here all the time. You gonna take over your grandpa's boat some day, Mick?"

"Absolutely!" I blurted out, and both men laughed.

"That's my lad", Grandpa said proudly, patted me on the shoulder and added, "Jem, now give me these potatoes. I've got some repairs to do at home, and Mary's gonna give me hell if I'm home too late to do anything but have dinner. Say hello to Martha for us."

Jem dragged a large sack from behind his counter. I volunteered to pick it up, but Grandpa hoisted it up on his own shoulders and said, "You can carry those nets, lad. Don't overexert yourself just yet." His tone was gruff, but the softness in his eyes spoke of genuine concern.

"Thanks for the spuds, Jem. See you."

As usual, we didn't talk a lot on our way home. Grandpa was panting a little under his load, and when I looked at him, I realized for the first time how he had aged. He was nearing seventy, and it began to show. I hoped he would be around for a long time, but I knew I couldn't take his presence for granted any more.

It didn't feel right to let him carry the heavy potatoes while I just had a few nets that needed mending tucked under my arm in a disorderly ball. "Are you sure I shouldn't carry that?" I inquired again.

"You take care of yourself, lad. You heard what the doctor said – fresh air and exercise are fine, but no exertion. We don't want you to have a relapse, do we? You know I'm not the worrying kind, but that was scary when your fever wouldn't go down and you'd do nothing but sleep."

I didn't comment on that, a little embarrassed at this unusual show of emotion. We remained silent until we arrived home. Grandma was delighted to see what we had brought along. While Grandpa filled her in on our day, I wandered off towards the narrow lane leading to the shore, where I sat down on a rock, legs loosely crossed, inhaling the fresh air tinged with salt, absent-mindedly fingering the little groove above my lip that was still sensitive to the touch.

It felt good to take deep breaths again without a sharp sting of pain in my chest. The doctor said I had been lucky not to develop pneumonia after my hour-long hike through the rain and cold.

"You're one tough cookie", Grandpa had said with a half admiring, half rueful smile after I had told him the whole story about my journey to Maine once I felt up to it. "You've got your mom's stubbornness and your father's stamina and strength. I can't help being a little proud of you for having the balls to really go through with that runaway thing, making your way here in the rain. Oh yes, I know, your mother would happily strangle me for saying that." He had laughed raucously, and I had grinned for the first time in what felt like weeks.

Now I was looking towards the near future with mixed feelings.

When it had been clear that I wouldn't recover in time to go back to Missouri before the school year ended, Mom had grudgingly agreed to let me stay right on until the end of the summer holidays. In return, Grandpa had summoned all his powers of persuasion until I had grudgingly agreed to endure that one last year in school.

"If you do want to become a fisherman, I want you to be an educated one", he had said with a wink. "I've always had trouble with the bookkeeping because I only went to school for five years. I want you to do better than me in this one respect." When I had begun to protest, he had added with twinkling eyes, "And besides, all that poetry you learn in school may help you win the heart of your girl one day."

I couldn't help smiling at the memory of that moment, even if I still disliked the thought of having to go back to the Midwest. At least it would only be for a while. I remembered how he had once, on a walk a long time ago, advised me to subside with regard to smaller things in order to get what was truly important to me.

And at least I had had my little moment of victory.

Before Mom left town, I had made it quite clear that I was indeed serious in wanting to follow in Grandpa's footsteps instead of attending college. Shedding some tears for the newly shattered dream of her son graduating from university, she had eventually grasped that I would not change my mind.

"I can't say I'm very pleased with that", she had said in a choked voice, wiping her eyes, "but I guess I will have to accept your choice."

This had been more than I had expected, actually.

I got up and climbed down the path hewn into the rock face to the sandy cove below, stretching out on the warm sand.

Some seagulls were circling above me. I watched them a little enviously as they rode on the breeze, twisted and turned in the wind, swooped up and down in elegant ease, the epitome of freedom that made me feel like a caged bird straining against the bars that imprisoned him. It might be a golden cage I had been forced into, but a cage nevertheless.

In a year's time, I would be free, too. I swore to myself I would never let anyone put me into a cage again. Golden or not.


End file.
